Mirror of success

Michael Pinkerton plays a thankless position on a team incapable of reaching the postseason.

But that can't stop the North Oconee kicker from finding special meaning as the Titans prepare for their final two games of a non-region schedule.

"We just had to adopt the mentality that even though we don't get to go any farther, we're helping the school, starting the football program," Pinkerton said. "We can only go up from here."

Pinkerton is one of seven seniors who started playing as a freshman during North Oconee's inaugural 0-10 season in 2004. Pinkerton and his teammates endured another woeful season the next year when the Titans finished 1-8. But redemption followed with a 7-3 record last year, and this season's team needs just one more win to claim the best record in school history.

North Oconee's improvement is mirrored by Pinkerton's.

Pinkerton - who is now 5-foot-10, 150 pounds - said he weighed about 85 pounds as a freshman. He never attempted a field goal that season. If he had, he wouldn't have been able to make one longer than 35 yards.

Three years later, the senior is 29 of 30 on extra points and is 5-for-6 on field goal attempts with a long of 44 yards. He said he's made field goals from 55 yards during practice.

"Those seniors started out little pencil-necked freshmen having to play a varsity schedule," North Oconee coach Terry Tuley said. "Michael couldn't kick the ball past the 30-yard line. ... He's improved to the point where he's a legitimate college kicker."

After the season, Pinkerton may face a tough decision. He'd like to play collegiate soccer, but North Oconee defensive line coach Michael Dowis and special teams coach Billy Bryan want Pinkerton to consider football.

Dowis, who kicked in college at Georgia Tech and Georgia Southern, said Pinkerton has a chance to kick in college if he finds the right situation.

"In 19 years of coaching kickers I've never seen a kid improve as much as he has in one year from his junior year to his senior year," said Dowis, who coached former Georgia kicker Billy Bennett at Athens Academy. "He put in a lot of work in the weight room and went off to camps. His form is very solid."

Pinkerton said he wasn't aware of that improvement until this year's spring game. He doesn't practice kicking field goals during the offseason in favor of a stretching and plyometric workout.

He said he noticed his leg was stronger during soccer games, but he didn't see the results until he converted a 50-yarder during practice.

To go along with Pinkerton's newfound distance, Tuley said the senior - who will finish his career as North Oconee's all-time leading scorer - also has a bevy of mental toughness.

"Kickers by nature are tagged with the thing that they're strange," Tuley said. "Michael doesn't fit that. He takes everything too personal when he misses, and that's a kicker's mentality. But he has the ability to isolate himself and just go do and do and do. That's what's made him the type of kicker that he is."

But before Pinkerton must decide between football and soccer, he and his teammates will play in the school's first homecoming game on Friday against Union County, which a shot at improving to 8-1.

"We've had big games before but we know that is going to be the game besides the Banks County game, because that was the memorial for coach (Shawn) Smith," Pinkerton said. "We're all pretty pumped about it."